EX-PARTE HEARING:

WHEN AN EMERGENCY ORDER IS NEEDED TO PROTECT THE CHILD

Sometimes one parent will completly ignore what they have agreed to do and the other parent will have to make an emergency request of the court for an emergency order. Unlike a regularly noticed motion, which is calendared and which both sides have time to prepare, for an ex-parte hearing the responding party is notified just the day before the ex-parte hearing. Because an ex-parte is an emergency hearing, judges usually hear these matter first each morning. If the matter brought before the judge could wait, or if the judge does not think the matter concerns the safety of the child the ex-parte request will most likely not be granted.

Nevertheless, custody orders may be modified via ex-parte when there is the possibility of immediate harm to the child like recent acts of domestic violence or sexual abuse of the child or if a parent is attempting to take the child out of California. These exemptions are outlined in California Family Code section 3065(a).

The Ex-Parte Hearing can be an effective tool in a custody case. Even if an ex-parte hearing emergency order is not granted and not really an emergency, it may still have been useful in bring to light certain information about the case to the judges attention. Also, an ex-parte may even result in certain new orders as a result of the responding party stipulating to certain requests at the ex-parte hearing even though the ex-parte request itself is not timely.

The attorneys at The Custody Firm are masters at using the Ex-Parte hearing as an effective tool to help their clients win important custody issues.